366 CYPERACE^. Cladium. 



Tribe VI. CLABIEJE. Nees. 



Flowers perfect (rarely diclinous). Spikelets 1 - 3 -flowered ; the scales imbricated in a 

 somewhat trifarious or quadrifarious order ; the loiOest ones empty. Perigynium none. 

 Stamens 2-12. Style 2 - 3-cleJt, deciduous, or sometimes with a persistent bulbous 

 base. Achenium with a hard thick shell, smooth or irregularly wrinkled, pointless, or 

 crowned ivith the persistent base of the style. — Spikelets cymose-paniculate. 



12. CLADIUM. Browne, Jam., p. 114 ; R. Br. prodr. p. 236. TWIG-RUSH. 



[ From the Greek, Idarhs, a branch or twig ; but the allusion is not very apparent.] 



Spikelets 1 - 2-flowered. Scales few, imbricated in a somewhat trifarious order ; the lowest 

 ones empty. Bristles none. Stamens mostly 2. Style 2 - 3-cleft ; the divisions often bifid 

 or trifid. Achenium globose-ovoid ; the pericarp thickened and corky toward the summit 

 Seed smooth. — Culm leafy. Spikelets mostly in compound axillary and terminal panicles 

 or cymes. 



1. Cladium mariscoides, Torr. Smooth Twig-rush. 



Culm obscurely triangular ; leaves nearly smooth on the margin ; cymes compound, 2-4- 

 rayed, nearly naked, the rays elongated ; spikelets aggregated in heads of 3 - 8 together ; 

 style 3-cleft, the divisions entire. — Torr. Cyp. p. 372. C. triglorneratum, Kunth, enum. 2. 

 p. 304 (excluding all the synonymy but that of Nees).* Schcenus mariscoides, Muhl. gram, 

 p. 5 ; Torr. fl. 1. p. 54 ; Bigel. fl. Bost. p. 17 ; Beck, bot. p. 428. 



Culm about 2 feet high, scarcely angular, nearly smooth, about a line and a half in diameter 

 towards the base. Leaves 1-2 lines wide, channelled, with a long compressed point, slightly 

 serrulate-scabrous on the margin. Cymes 2-3, erect ; the lateral ones on long exserted 

 peduncles : primary rays 2-4, with several shorter ones. Spikes about 3 lines long, ovoid- 

 oblong when mature, often many of them abortive. Scales about G, chestnut-brown ; the 4 

 lower ones usually empty ; the fifth bearing 2 stamens and an abortive ovary ; the uppermost 

 perfect, diandrous. Style filiform, deciduous ; the divisions nearly equal, or sometimes two 

 of them united towards the base. Achenium a little more than a line in length, ovoid, with a 

 short abrupt point, somewhat wrinkled longitudinally. 



Bog meadows and borders of ponds : frequent. Fl. July. Fr. August. Resembles C. 

 mariscus, R. Brown, in many respects ; but that species is much stouter, the leaves strongly 

 serrulate-scabrous on the margin and keel, and the cymes more numerous as well as more 

 compact. 



* Nees, by a mistake which he afterwards corrected, referred (in Linnaa, 9. p. 301) this plant, which he considered 

 Sderia triglonicrala, to Cladium, and named it C Irighmcratum. This error has been strangely adopted by Kunth, who 

 remarks that he has seen a specimen of mine under the name of Sc. triglomcTola. This specimen must have had the 

 wrong ticket attached to it by some accident. 



